i got old (what did you expect)
by Vilinye
Summary: I will age for you, if it pleases you. I will match you, wrinkle for wrinkle, grey hair for grey hair, crease for crease, wrinkle for wrinkle. You will be so beautiful when you are old.—Deathless Of course River would come for Christmas. Christmas is about family, after all. And when your family needs you, you stay till the end.
1. Honey, I'm Home

"Is anybody hurt? No? Thank goodness. Now, Adrian, Leigh, Johnny, Kiera, and Regan, pile the bodies outside the church. Friya and Lizzette, get a fire going. Let me know if anyone's missing, and Barnable, pop inside and bring some wires from the workbench—not the blue ones, the purple. Make sure they're purple. "

"I'll find the most."

"No, me!"

"Come back when you're done, and we'll all have cocoa together, and biscuits."

"Marshmallows?" Kiera asked.

"You've been poking into my private stash." He winked. "Maybe. Just maybe."

Kiera nodded back and raced off.

The Doctor sighed. He wasn't expecting anything worse than bruised knuckles and scorched siding this time, but it was close. Too close. Tasha's force fields kept out the Cybermen, Daleks,Sycorax, and Drahvins, but it was like spreading high-quality caviar on Mark & Spenser's entire stock of bread; you just couldn't cover everything.

Wind gusted past, spilling snow like a child with sprinkles. Except it was cold and damp and all one color—not sprinkles, then, powdered sugar. Powdered sugar , mm, that would be good. Except they didn't have powdered sugar on Christmas, and what good was Christmas without sweeties? He'd have to make a note of it for next time he visited Tasha, write out a shopping list. Strands of lights, and Yorkshire pudding, maybe some Turkish Delight and of course jammey dodgers…

The outside noises faded away. Children scampered across the main square, throwing snowballs at each other, while a roaring fire blazed off to one side. Where was Barnable with those wires? And what was that noise?

_Vroop. _

No, it couldn't be. He had imagined it. Sending Clara away in the TARDIS was like splitting Siamese twins, but it had to be done. Nothing was going to happen to her because of him. He'd promised himself.

_Vroop. Vroop. _The pewter sky flickered blue.

Barnable emerged from the church, wires clutched tightly. "Is it another attack?"

"No, it's my ship."

"What?"

"My TARDIS. That's how I came here, remember?"

The TARDIS fully materialized. Almost before she finished, a woman staggered out , nearly falling in the snow.

Her shimmering dress* left her shoulders and collarbone bare; her hair was piled atop her head in a woven mess of curls. "Hello, sweetie."

River.

_River. _But she was—that is—never mind timelines, that's River. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, I know the old girl isn't a taxi service, but what else was I supposed to do when she parked herself between the sofa and the coffee table? The moment I walked in, poof, she was off. Wouldn't even wait for me to do the environment checks once we landed—just booted me out. What sort of trouble have you gotten yourself into this time?"

"It's not exactly trouble—not on its own, really, it's more a matter of how the rest of the universe is responding to it, like Parliament and taxes you know, nobody would care about a raise in the television fee if it wasn't splashed across the headlines each night—-"

River gave him the look—no, not _that _look,the other look, the one that meant **and what time you call this?**

"It's downstairs." He led her into the cathedral basement, shoving aside half-finished projects and wood shavings. It wasn't the TARDIS workrooms, but it was still soothing to fiddle and design and engineer, even if it was only someone's barn. They stopped in front of the crack.

"Well then. " If she was surprised, she hid it well. Her tone was equally suited to going out for groceries or a Sontaran trooper interrupting supper. She even reached into her pocket for her scanner device. "A mysterious message, spreading terror throughout the universe, and no one knows what it says."

"Do they?" he repeated, a hint of teasing in the words.

"Well," she set the pad aside. "I could have saved myself the research—yes, research, I didn't just jump in the TARDIS straight away—no one in the universe could understand that message."

"Except us." He didn't need to ask where she was—younger River may break out of StormCage for a shopping spree, but only older River was this certain he needed her help.

River whispered the words carefully, like a snowflake melting on her tongue. _Doctor who_? The Gallifreyan plea felt awkward: since when did Time Lords ask for anything? They spoke, and it was so.

Explanations could wait.

River glanced at the worn mattress shoved against the wall. "Good thing I brought the TARDIS back. That bed's a bit small for two."

"What—you're staying?"

"I didn't close my lease, resign my teaching position, and risk temporal collapse by getting into an uncontrolled TARDIS just to sleep on the floor."

"You—you did what? River, it's dangerous."

"And the rest of our lives aren't?" That was definitely the _other_ look, the he's-hot-when-he's-clever-face, as he'd called it in Florida.

"I can't ask you to give everything up for a crotchety old man."

"You didn't ask; the TARDIS did. The old girl can be quite persuasive." She laid a hand on his shoulder. "Do you really want me to go?"

"It's been a long time, a very long time." But there's one more thing he had to know, one factor she should consider before settling down with him. "Your parents will miss you."

"I've had time for goodbyes."

She doesn't say _I've done Manhattan, _but he reads the footnotes to her careful words. "You can have the bed—I'll find us a new one later. I have stuff to do, I won't sleep…"

"I wasn't planning on it either."


	2. Settling In

The bark shavings curled and crumpled into black ash, igniting slender twigs. Slowly, the pyramid-stacked logs sparked to life, filling the room with golden light. River glanced from the fire to the semicircle of wooden chairs. A smooth-hewed table sat against the wall, already covered with a dissembled temporal inhibitor.

"Why can't you just work on that in the TARDIS?"

"You're the only one who can find me in there. What if we have an emergency?" The Doctor didn't even look up from his work.

""You could have reactivated the phone system. It worked fine while you were building the house."

"No, no. That was only a temporal solution. Communications must be synchronized throughout the entire ship, or you keep calling yourself—did that a few times, wasn't keen to mess with it again."

River sighed. "We can't keep popping into the TARDIS every time I want the clothes cleaned or you need more cables."

"Once I network the architectural reconfiguration system with a remote projector, that won't be a problem. Certain rooms will be rerooted to a separate, free-standing structure with self-sustaining architecture and only residual atron energy."

"And?"

"And….er…well, those rooms—not the console room or the architectural reconfiguration room itself, but the exported rooms themselves will anchor the transcendental shell, ground her as it were, convey the implication that her owners are committed to defending the location as for a good long while." He paused. "If you've changed your mind about staying, I'll give you a lift out, but it will have to be soon."

River pulled another chair up to the table. "You're **_not_**cannibalizing her. "

"No, no, of course not. I wouldn't—I couldn't—"

"Then why?"

He shook his head, refusing to meet her eyes.

"Tell me. You haven't been inside her for days. And even when you're working on her, you won't let me in to help. What's wrong?"

"Amy said once that this—stars and planets and monsters—felt like running away. I said that wasn't it at all, I was running to things. All those brief, brilliant, wonderful things—people," he corrected himself. "There's nothing left. Why not stay?"

River wrapped her hands around his. "But…"

"All those little days, River. The ones that separate the big ones, like the plastic wrappers in a biscuit tin. We've had breakfast in Paris, tea in Kensington Gardens, the premiere of Agamemnon in the evening. But a day that starts at midnight or sunrise or sunset— and ends twenty-four hours later, on the same planet, in the same time, just like everyone else…"

"We've had a few of those."

"Involving Daleks, Weeping Angels, or the Votaries of Perpetual Precipitation," he protested. "A day where nothing happens…"

"We're living next to a crack in the universe with the potential to unleash an unending war that would consume galaxies in seconds. I don't think that will be a problem."


	3. Snowdrops

Left; no, not that left, the other left." A wrist slap confirmed which side was meant. "And stop picking at the blindfold."

"That's half the fun."

"For two year olds." River tightened the blindfold.

He gave up on the cloth and let his hand slide down.

"Well, if that's how you want it."

Green! Olive, evergreen, pine, mint, moss, teal, shamrock, olive—admittedly, in small, speckled rows, but it was more green than he had seen since landing in Christmas. "Where are we?" He glanced around the room. Utility shelves stretched from left to right, with barely enough space to squeeze around at the ends. The shelves were crammed full of pots, ranging from rough-hewn clay to a priceless early Chin dynasty vase. Each pot spilled variegated foliage: saw-toothed, lobed, smooth, pale, bright, fine-veined or ribbed.

"You don't think all the food here comes from your little chats with Tasha, do you?"

"No, not at all, I just—oh, that's brilliant. Static solution hydroponics, but where's the light coming from?" He craned his neck. "The solar energy is collected and stored—higher level of technology than I'd initially expected, but with limited resources…"

River paused to pry the cover off a baththub-sized bucket, revealing eggshells, fruit peelings, wood shavings and sawdust. "Compost is coming along nicely."

"Compost? Why? Hydroponics don't even use soil."

"For the annuals, no. But fruit trees and the larger perennials can't support themselves in liquid solutions. So if you want anything sweet besides beets, we'd better get to it."

"Can I help?" The Doctor's eyes gleamed.

"Sure. Take one of these trowel and aerate the soil."

He began eagerly digging. At first, he loosened each scoop, swirling the contents , but as the hole deepened, he became obsessed with obtaining the precise ratio of dry and damp material.

"It's compost, not an archeological dig." River chuckled.

"Better get used to it; I don't think Christmas has the ruins of an ancient temple or mysterious complex to keep you busy." He winked at her. "Of course, I have other ideas if you care to hear them…"


	4. Skirmishes

"You stay here; I'm going in to get a closer look."

"River, there's at least a dozen left; you can't take them on alone."

"Come along, then. Or are you saying I can't handle some kids with snowballs and slingshots?"

There was no good answer to this question. If he disapproved, she'd tussle him up like a turkey and turn traitor, breaking their 20-0 winning streak. If he approved, she'd pack the kids into snowbanks like kippers. (It had been a very long game, starting with the holographic projector _someone _had nicked from the TARDIS.) "Can't we negotiate?"

"Not this time." River glanced at her wristband computer . "It's here, I'm sure of it."

"Well, then." The Doctor smiled. "Time for an old trick." He stood up, brushed the snow from his purple coat. "Anybody care for some marshmallows?"

Snowballs whizzed through the air, some breaking apart midflight, some diving to the ground. One smashed into the Doctor's left check. "Oye, that's not nice!"

His plea was answered with another half-dozen snowballs.

"River!"

No one answered. Two kids stepped out from the trees, more snowballs in hand.

"Now, really? I said I had marshmallows, I'd be willing to share. Or jammy dodgers, I'm sure I have some left in the TARDIS."

Two snowballs swooped over the Doctor's head, like spring birds chasing each other. Somehow they changed direction and zoomed towards the kids, who shrieked and ran back to the woods. The Doctor grinned. That's his River.

In front of him, the Doctor heard giggles and teasing shrieks, soon cut off by the thud of snowballs. Off to the side, perhaps forty-five degrees or so, he noticed something odd. It was just a starberry bush, but the marble-sized fruit is glowing white, not pale blue. The branches aren't as full as they should be either. It's an impression of a starberry, not a real—a hologram. "River, I found the holopro." The word tickled his tongue. Holopro. Holopro. Cool word. He bent over to dismantle the starberry hologram.

A green globe floated at the edge of his vision. "Something wrong with you? What'd those kids do? I'll fix it, don't you worry…" He looked up properly.

The holopro wasn't malfunctioning. He wasn't seeing thing. "Rutans." The jellyfish shape danged from a tree branch barely twenty feet away.

"We have been sent to contain the danger. We must ensure the question is never answered."

Rotten Rutans. "What's with the plural? Delusions of royalty, are we?"

"We are nothing. We must ensure the safety of all our people. This planet has been declared the greatest threat to our nation."

"Above the Sontarans? Did you hear that, River?" He raised his voice, but continued to fiddle with the holopro. "I am a greater threat to the Rutans then their archenemy. Quite an accomplishment, wouldn't you say?" He could hear footsteps in the distance, but the Rutan couldn't. Jellyfish weren't built for long-distance, non-aquatic communications.

"You must be destroyed."

There. He turned to look the Rutan in the eye. Or in the center of the floating blobby bits, anyway. "Think you might have a little competition. Those Sontarans fairly determined to do the job themselves."

Four Sontarans, blasters primed and aimed, approached through the trees.

The Rutan quivered slightly. "You are our mission." It twisted a few tentacles together, like a person wringing his hands. "But they are our mortal foes."

The moment the Rutan turned away, the Doctor bolted for the forest. It was darker under the trees, and he thought he could see figures moving. Not Rutans, though. Human, or at least humanoid. "River," he called quickly. "River."

She stepped out from behind a clump of cedars. "What is it?"

"Rutans. Used the holopro to create some Sontarans and distract them, but we have to get the kids back to Christmas. "

"Right. Party's over, kids. " She reached into her pocket and pulled the familiar squareness gun.


End file.
